Rationalizing Country Music

First let me say that I love country music. I like alt-rock and roots rock and some Americana too but I love country. I write country songs and when I can't decide what to listen to I usually wind up listening to some incarnation of country.But man, as a songwriter I analyze some of the songs and when picked apart I find some of them don't hold up to rationalization.The most obvious example of this is the incongruity of a sad, heartbreak message married to a happy, shuffling or even driving melody and tempo. Oddly I think of one just now but they are ubiquitous.Another thing that gets me is the often attempted and occassionally perfect country road song. The best ones match a "to-hell'with-it-all" lyric with pedal to the metal music. In the tradition of Hank Snow's "I've Been Everywhere" many of these songs sound like the songwriter pulled out a road atlas and just picked a bunch of cities that fit the rhyme scheme of the song. Road songs are fun but I doubt many people actually quit their job, get in a car, and start driving. Life is too complicated for that. There are utilities to turn off and leases to terminate.And speaking of complications the favorite thing for most songwriters to do is pen an emotional ballad. Why? Because they are easy to put original sounding music to since they are slow and slow country songs can be more free form than more uptempo ones. And ballads are easy to write. Just tell a story, keeping a decent eye on the meter and not stretching the rhymes too far and you have a song about best friends or dying or that first dance with your wife that will make people cry and feel warm fuzzies. "Butterfly Kisses", "Angels In Waiting", anything by Rascal Flatts...the only thing to keep in mind is people don't want to hear a whole concert of those songs.So the producer and artist pick a few good ballads then some incongruously fast heartbreak songs and a couple road songs and a new country album is born.
If you want to hear the best country album of the past half decade listen toRobbie Fulk's Georgia Hard...its an excellent tribute to the country of the 1970's.